The building can house 150 soldiers and stock enough fuel and food to let them work there autonomously for a year and a half, the ministry said.

The soldiers can move around the base from one building to another without going outside to face winter temperatures which can reach minus 47 degrees Celsius (-57 degrees Fahrenheit). Fuel can be pumped in from tankers.

Franz Josef Land is a chain of islands between the Barents and Kara seas north of Novaya Zemlya archipelago.

It has maintained a Russian border post but the military presence there was withdrawn in the 1990s. It returned last November, when the Northern Fleet dispatched air defence contingents there.